Seeking
by NiceIceEdward
Summary: A preview into a fictional moment in Bella's life during the long months that Edward is missing. It's a quick read, enjoy.


_**A/N: This is a fic-lette that I wrote, set in the period of time of New Moon when Edward has left. It actually should be read while listening to a specific song. That song can be found at youtube (dot) com /watch?v=S-ets2ZvWwc. You'll have to remove any spaces and replace (dot) with an actual period when you copy/paste that into your address bar. I recommend opening a new tab or window to play it. It's a beautiful song, and suits the story very well I think. Enjoy the fic, and if you like it, please let me know.**_

Sometimes you're aware of everything. it's a choice. Sometimes you choose not to be aware of anything. I'd chosen to be oblivious of the cold, the wet, the sunless day around me. In short I'd chosen to be numb. I could feel the knuckles of roots whose twisted fingers rippled the ground beneath me, but I chose to ignore them as well.

With my eyes closed, and the pebble-like sensation of each rain drop pelting my skin as I lay there on the forest floor, I became just another branch or tree. Just another surface the endless rain blanketed in its travels towards the surrounding rivers and seashores. One more piece of the land that was the sturdy base of this place. The solidness of the ground under me, and the constancy of the rain from above me made me feel strong. Like a rock. Attacked, but not broken.

I stretched my arms out, sliding my hands softly across the ground. I felt each tiny tug as the sticks, pebbles and jagged earth tore at me. They reached out towards me, like they wanted to keep me there.

Little could they guess that I was all too willing to simply melt into my surroundings. Because if I was part of the land, part of the sky, the tree, the rock, the earth, then I would be timeless. If I were timeless, this time without Edward couldn't cut me every moment with its infinite razors edge. I wouldn't notice the months passing, would I?

I heard the crunch-break, crunch-break, crunch-break of footsteps approaching me. It couldn't be Charlie. I would have heard his cruiser long before he'd have been close enough to reach me on foot. That left me only one other option. Only one other person would come to see me, I'd alienated everyone else. It was only his innate stubbornness that had kept him from abandoning me.

"Do you have something against indoor plumbing, Bells?" I could hear the chuckle he forced, but the worry that colored his attempt at humor was painful to hear.

I pulled my hands back towards my sides and then used them to help push myself up into a sitting position.

"Do you have something against privacy?" I asked him in the same tone, but instead of worry coloring my voice, I let it carry a different undertone. Mine said, "_I'm alright, just...well, you know_." I emphasized this thought with a shrug.

The very corners of his eyes tightened. Anyone else would have missed it. I wasn't anyone else.

I stood up and pushed the hood of my jacket back off my head. Looking up, I let the rain hit my face for just a moment longer, and sighed deeply.

"Anyone ever told you you're kind of weird?"

"Yeah, must have been the same person who told you that you're kind of annoying." I answered his sardonic question, smiling to cut the sharpness of the words. I didn't want to hurt his feelings. He was the only friend I had left, and I desperately needed him. Probably more than even _**I**_ realized.

Lightning flashed just at that moment. A thunderclap, that was so loud it rattled the age-loosened nuts and bolts on my truck, sounded. I took another deep breath with my face still turned up toward the sky, and then looked back at him.

"Come on, are you hungry?"

He grunted deeply, and sarcastically.

"I'm always hungry."

That was strange to me. I was never hungry anymore, and besides, no amount of eating could ever fill the hole in my middle anyway.

That hole was eternally empty, burned into my flesh. Sometimes I could feel it. I worried in late hours if one day it would stop just being in my head, and I'd stand up and everything inside of me would just fall to the ground in tiny, withered piles all around me.

I walked to the door he held open and walked past him. As he closed the door behind us, I strained to listen to the last note of the music of the rain. One last note to keep in my head, so that it blocked out the void that lived there most of the time. The silence that was filled by nothing but the fading memories of the sound of his voice.

A short creak and a slight click, and the sound was cut off by the door. Into the deafening silence once again.

_**F/N: Don't forget to review, thanks**_


End file.
